


A Drunken Dream

by HisAngelThursday



Category: Supernatural
Genre: (as in: Dean wants sex but Cas won't do it with him because he's drunk), Angst with a Happy Ending, Cuddling & Snuggling, Depressed Dean, Drunk Dean, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Hurt/Comfort, Love Confessions, Loving Castiel, M/M, Sharing a Bed, mentions of rape/non-con
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-18
Updated: 2017-04-20
Packaged: 2018-10-20 10:21:14
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,002
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10660557
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HisAngelThursday/pseuds/HisAngelThursday
Summary: After a particularly taxing hunt, an inebriated, self-loathing Dean demands to know why Cas would keep coming back to him.





	1. Chapter 1

“Cas, why…why do keep comin’ back to me?”

Dean slurs the question out as Cas helps him back to his bedroom at approximately three in the morning, arm slung over his shoulder like a soldier wounded in combat.

Cas had come home about thirty minutes prior to discover him half-conscious at the kitchen table, empty liquor bottles surrounding him like garnish. Apparently, their latest hunt had not gone well: they killed the pagan god they were after, but not before five virgins were killed. 

Dean hadn’t taken it well. 

“I mean it, Cas,” he repeats, when Cas ignores it the first time. “Why do you keep comin’ back.”

“Shush, Dean,” says Cas, gently but firmly. “You’re drunk.”

“I’ve never been no good for you, Cas,” Dean slurs, sounding emotional. “Never…never no good.” 

“That isn’t true. And you just used a double negative.”

“Naw, no, no, you’re bein’…you’re bein’ too nice to me,” Dean insists, holding up an unsteady index finger. “I…I hurt you, Cas, I know I did. I made you leave the bunker when you were all…all human and squishy. Anything could’ve happened to you out there, but did I care?” He shakes his head adopting an exaggerated scowl. “Naaaaawww. Big man Dean Winchester, he doesn’t care what happens to his buddies. They lose they’re angel powers, an’ BAM! He kicks ‘em to the curb.”

Cas swallows, not liking to dwell on the subject. “You’re referring to yourself in the third person,” he states, attempting to divert the subject. “That is also grammatically -”

“And when I was all high on the Mark of Cain, an’ I nearly killed you? I never even tried to apologize for that, not…not proper anyway.”  
He examines him out of the corner of his pinkened eye, red rims Christmas-y in conjecture with the green. “You…you wanna know why, Cas?” 

“Dean, you’re highly inebriated. I’d advise you not to say anything you’ll later -” 

“’Cause how do I ever,” he says anyway, free arm waving emphatically. “Make up for somethin’ like that? Huh? Do I just say, ‘sorry, buddy, I nearly…killed ya in cold blood in your own home,’ an’ just leave it at that? What am I s’posed to do, Cas? Huh? What am I s’pose to do, besides pretend it never happened?”

“You’re doing just fine, Dean,” Cas offers, which sounds bizarre in context, but he doesn’t know what else to say.

“Oh! And when you were crazy,” Dean continues, barking out a drunk, humorless cackle. “Let me tell ya, Cas, the way I treated you? I spent every last day I was in Purgatory regrettin’ that…wishin’…wishin’ I coulda done different. ‘Specially if I wasn’t never gonna see you again.” He pauses, drilling idly at his ear with his pinky finger. “But then I found you, and what was I s’pose to do then, Cas? Huh? What was I s’pose to say?” 

“Dean -”

“’Oh, heya, Cas. Just wanna tell ya, I take back what I said about not carin’ that you’re broken an all.’”

“Dean.”

“’Yeah, I’m awful sorry you’re broken, Cas. I’m sorry I broke ya, when you first touched me in Hell, an’ I had to take it out on you because I just couldn’t come to terms with it. That I had to make myself hate you just to come to terms with the fact that the one good…one beautiful thing that happened to me, was broken because -” 

“Dean! That is enough,” Cas snaps, willing himself not to hear anymore. “We’re almost at your bedroom. Until then, I’d thank you to remain quiet.”

“Okay, okay. Sheesh,” Dean huffs. “Mister Bossy Pants allova sudden…”

Soon, they round the corner to Dean’s bedroom. With the help of his grace, the door swings open and they lope over to Dean’s bed, where Cas lets him flop back on the memory foam. 

He kneels down beside the bed in an serendipitous recreation of the prayer position, stooping to undo the laces of Dean’s combat boots.

“Y’know after the apocalypse,” Dean’s voice slurs out above him. “You…you stayed.” He props himself on his elbows, watching as the skilled, slender fingers undo his shoelaces. “Why’d you do that, Cas? Why’d you stay for me, after all your buddies went home?”

Cas’s brow rumples. “What are you talking about, Dean? There never was an apocalypse.”

“Not for reals, maybe,” Dean concedes. “But in the alternate timeline Mister Dick-With-Wings Zach sent to me, there sure’s hell was. And you…you were still there, Cas: doped up on prescription pills and down a pair of wings, but you were still there.” Dean’s voice is different now, almost quietly perplexed, as though he just can’t figure out why anyone would endure that for his benefit.

Cas says nothing, the delicate fan of his eyelashes prominent over his cheekbones as he occupies himself with pealing off Dean’s second combat boot. 

“You…you died for me, Cas,” Dean says incredulously, as if realizing it for the first time. “You died, you died willingly, for me.” He pauses, staring off, comprehensively, into space. “And not just then, but…but so many other times, too. Why’d you do that for me, Cas? Why’d you keep comin’ back to a guy who’d ‘cause you all that much trouble?”

Cas sighs, getting to his feet with a soft oof. 

“Dean,” he says quietly, looking down at the drunken figure with soft, sad eyes. “I think, deep in your heart, you already know why.”

Dean stares at him, then he swallows wetly, head shaking lightly from side to side. “No. No, I gotta hear you say it.” 

“Dean -” Cas starts to protest, but he’s cut off by the feeling of Dean’s warm, calloused palm grasping his own. It’s a desperate gesture, almost a plea in and of itself.

“Please, Cas,” he whispers. “Just this once, I gotta hear it. I need to hear you say the words.” 

Cas looks down at him, at the damp, desperate green eyes looking up at him, silently begging for an answer. Cas wets his lips. 

“It’s because I love you,” he whispers. 

Dean swallows, blinking wetly. “Say it again.”

Cas’s eyes flutter shut, thumb stroking almost subconsciously over Dean’s. This wasn’t how he wanted his first ‘I love you’ to go, but then, when did the universe ever behave according to plan?

“I love you, Dean.”

It’s still barely audible, but it’s evidently all Dean needs. Next thing Cas knows, he’s being tugged down into an open-mouthed kiss, Dean’s warm, wet lips still somewhat bitter with the residual taste of whisky. 

Cas’s first instinct is to melt into the sensation, to cherish Dean’s pliable, human warmth forever and ever, right here and now, but he forces himself to pull away. 

“No,” he says firmly, pushing Dean back onto the bed. “No, Dean, you’re drunk. It isn’t right.” 

“Please,” Dean whines, still attempting to follow the sensation. “Please, Cas, I…I want this, I swear I do, I’ve waited so long -” 

“So have I. But I will wait until you’re sober and able to give me proper consent.” 

“Damn it, Cas, m’not a vessel.” Dean sounds frustrated. “And I’m not some sort of chick, either, so you don’t need to -”

“I always need consent,” Cas almost snaps at him. “You are the person I love, Dean, and I’ll respect your boundaries even if you do not.”

Dean looks as though he’s about to say something else, then thinks better of it, mouth flopping slightly open and then closed again. He looks almost abashedly off to the side.

Cas can see he’s feeling uncertain, somewhat embarrassed about propositioning Cas so aggressively. He squeezes his hand reassuringly. 

“Go to sleep, Dean,” he says gently. “I’ll still be here when you wake up.”

Dean looks at him hopefully. “You will?”

“Of course,” he assures him. It’s only when he strokes his thumb over Dean’s that he realizes they’re still holding hands. “I always watch over you, Dean.” 

Dean’s adam’s apple bobs as he swallows, appearing to think it over. “Will you…will you lay in bed with me?” Cas eyes him dubiously, and Dean’s eyelids flutter. “Please, I just wanna hold you…just wanna feel you. I won’t try anything, I promise.”

Cas considers it, but finds himself cracking under the pleading emerald gaze. He crawls into bed, trench coat and all, allowing his head to rest atop Dean’s rib cage. He finds it comforting, the rhythmic thud of his heartbeat, the steady heave of his lungs. 

It only occurs to him that this is happening, really happening, as he feels Dean’s warm, strong arms envelope him, and he realizes that he actually said it: after all this time, he told Dean he loves him. 

Of course, he’s said it before, in what he thought would be his last moments after being impaled by the venomous spear, but this time is different: Sam and Mary aren’t here, and there’s no room for ambiguity as to who he’s talking to. He’s told Dean he loves him. 

Up till now, he’s been too preoccupied with managing Dean’s drunkeness to realize the full magnitude of what’s just transpired. Now he’s beginning to, and it’s frankly overwhelming. 

“You’ll be here when I wake up, right?” Dean inquires, jogging him from his introspective stupor.

“Yes, Dean. Go to sleep,” he murmurs, adding, “I love you,” just to confirm to himself that he actually said it. Finally said it. 

“I love you too, Cas. G’night.” 

Cas swallows, attempting to pretend his entire sense of reality hasn’t been completely upended. They’ll have a lot to talk about in the morning. 

“Goodnight, Dean.”


	2. Chapter 2

Dean sluggishly returns to the world of the living with a throbbing behind his eyes and a dull ache in his muscles. He squirms around a little, half-conscious, attempting to find some way to make his position somewhat more comfortable. 

Then he realizes there's someone on top of him, lying with their cheek flush to Dean's chest. His eyes pop open, looking down in surprise to see a soft shock of blackish bedhead, and oh. Oh, God, he remembers everything. 

The events of the night prior hit him like a freight train. 

He remembers the fifteen-year-old bleeding out in his arms, the fifth virgin they'd been unable to save, holding her hand and telling her she was going to be alright when every part of him knew she wasn't. He remembers sitting outside in the Impala and watching her mother's face as Sam broke the news. He remembers how selfishly, indescribably guilty her death had made him feel, the unsolicited torrent of lost friends and innocents suddenly bombarding his mind. Everyone he's ever been unable to save. Everyone he's ever lost.

He only spiraled further down his depressing Memory Lane with each ounce of liquor he ingested, and the sadder the got, the more he drank. Sam was still wrapping up loose ends from their latest case back in Mississippi, and Cas was God knows where, so for the time being, it was just Dean and drugs and clinical depression. 

And a slew of lost friends to reflect on. 

Dad ditched him without second thought as soon as he was able, but that didn't make his inevitable death any less Dean's fault. Mary was, while a fine hunter and woman, had no apparent qualms about leaving him for the career she'd supposedly so despised. Bobby, Charlie, Jo and Ellen, Ash, Kevin, and countless other good people had bit the dust, and Dean would be lying if he didn't think there were countless things he could have done to prevent every single one of them. Sam, of course, only clung to him because he didn't have any other family left. 

With this skewed, self-loathing line of drunken reasoning, Dean was sure that there wasn't a single person he'd ever loved that, one way or another, hadn't left him. And you know? By the time he was through, he'd decided most were better off that way, either kickin' it on Cloud 9 in Paradise or doing something that didn't involve him. It was better this way, really. Better for everyone that they left him, because people who stuck around him only ever got hurt. 

And everyone, one way or another, left him. Everyone except Cas.

Dean's drug-addled mind had perked up at that observation, baffled as to why Cas -- or anyone, for that matter -- would willingly subject themselves to that. It wasn't as though he hadn't hurt Cas. If anything, he'd hurt him more than anyone else: he'd been responsible for his demise on multiple occasions, be it messy and callous beneath the force of archangels, dissolving into blackish tar, or impaled on the end of an angel blade. Cas had been broken in more ways than he could count because of Dean, over and over: he'd lost his sanity and his wings and his life, been beaten and broken and humbled in every sense of the word, but never did he once take the very simple option of leaving what was very clearly the cause of his tribulations. 

Every time Dean thought he had, every time he'd been sure ET had gone home for good, he'd be greeted with the familiar beige trench coat and signature growl of "Hello, Dean." Time after time after time. It just didn't make any sense. 

Unless...

No. No, Dean wouldn't let himself think about that. Hadn't let himself think about it, not seriously, since he was fourteen years old. He'd go out to bars and ride bulls of one sort or another, but as long as no one he knew knew about it, it didn't have to be real to him. Dean Winchester could remain straight, and Cas could remain his weird, dorky little buddy. Nothing more, nothing less. 

So Dean drank, and willed for the tug in his heart to go away. It didn't.

He was barely conscious by the time Cas got home, helped him back to bed and patiently listened to his embarrassing, drunken rants. Dean feels equal parts mortified and in awe about the things that were said, the things that -- almost -- were done.

More than anything, he remembers Cas said he loves him. 

More than anything, he remembers Cas stayed. 

"Are you awake, Dean?" I grumbling voice inquires, the thrum of it vibrating pleasantly against Dean's chest. 

Dean freezes momentarily, unprepared, but wills himself to relax. It's just Cas. Just beautiful, complicated, weird, perfect Cas, actually in his arms after so, so long. 

He forces a chuckle. "Yeah, I'm awake. How'd you know?"

"Well, I *am* a celestial being," Cas supplies haughtily, sounding mildly offended. 

Dean chuckles again, genuine this time. "Yes. Yes you are." 

There's a short silence, and Dean can feel the tickle of his soft hair as he turns to look up at him, sees a flash of luminous blue eyes beneath delicate lashes. Dean feels his heart flutter as Cas wets his lips. 

"How much..." he starts to say, voice carefully level. "How much do you remember?"

Dean stares at him. It would be very easy to lie here, to profess he'd blacked out for most of it and make some characteristically 'no-homo' type remark while inquiring why Cas appeared to be cuddling with him in his bed, and then let life slide back into normal. God knows they'd done that before, after speeches and confessions that would have marked the undeniable start of any other relationship. Even after Cas had told Dean he'd loved him back in Ramiel's barn, and though Sam and Mary had been there, Dean had known, deep down, that Cas had first and foremost been talking to him. 

Life could go on, and Dean Winchester could remain a straight, unattached ladies-man drifter. He'd never have to worry about the vulnerability of letting Cas into his heart.

But then, he looks down into those electric blue orbs, like swimming pools on a summer's day, looking at him with all the fear and adoration usually reserved for worship. And he knows, deep down, that he already has. 

So instead, Dean nuzzles into the soft darkish hair, smiling softly as he pulls his angel closer. "I remember I love you, if that's what you're talkin' about." 

It's strange to him, how casually he can say it. It's evidently even stranger to Cas, because Dean can feel him jolt in his arms.

"You...you do?" he inquires, still sounding uncertain, as though expecting Dean to yell 'PSYCHE!' at any moment.

"Yee-up. And if memory serves, I'm pretty sure you said you loved me too. So, y'know," he shrugs his shoulders, grinning his cockiest possible grin and trying not to betray how vulnerable he feels about the subject. "No take-backsies." 

Cas looks up at him again, brow furrowed and expression quietly incredulous. Instead of answering, Dean watches him move closer, makes no move to resist as the soft, chapped lips come to rest delicately, almost tentatively, on his own. Cas kisses him like Dean is a baby deer, slight and small boned and easy to spook. 

As much as Dean enjoys the tender treatment, he lets his hand snake up the beige-coated back, coaxing him into kisses that are deeper, more intimate, more intense. He can feel the tickle of Cas's stubble, the softness of his lips, the delicate bunny-licks of his tongue, and Dean's chest fills with fluttery warmth as he realizes they're actually doing this.

"Cas?" Dean inquires, breathlessly, between kisses. It occurs to him exactly how much their hands are moving right now, a subconscious effort to explore each other's bodies.

"Yes, Dean." 

"Say it...say it again." 

"I love you, Dean," Cas supplies, without hesitation. "I always will." 

Lips crash together, more intense than anything Dean has ever felt, and warmth pools in belly. He barely has time to breath out, "I love you, too."

"Cas?" he asks again, after a minute or so.

"Yes, Dean."

"Why're we still wearing so much clothes?"


End file.
